Aliya Anjum - Muslim Inventions in the Islamic Golden Age 750-1500 AD

MUSLIM INVENTIONS IN THE ISLAMIC GOLDEN AGE

750-1500 AD

Aliya Anjum

Copyright 2012

All Rights Reserved.

Published by Kolachi Publishers

Commendation Certificate

National Book Foundation, Pakistan 2009

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Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) was born in 570 A.D in Mecca (Makkah) Saudi Arabia. He started to preach Islam to the Arabs around 610 A.D and continued to do so for almost 23 years till he met His Creator in 632 A.D

After Muhammad, under the influence of Islam, the Arabs underwent a radical transformation from desert dwelling tribesmen to a highly disciplined and sophisticated society. In the reign of Caliph Umar (634-644 AD) in an astonishingly short time span, Muslims conquered Roman (Byzantine) and Persian territories. The mighty empires of Rome and Persia fell at the hands of legendary warriors Khalid bin Walid and Amr bin Al-Aas in battles that changed the world. Over the next few centuries, Muslim Caliphs ruled over the Middle East, North Africa, Central Asia, Turkey, and later even parts of Europe (Greece, Ukraine, Romania, Macedonia, Hungary, Serbia, Bulgaria, Bosnia, Spain, Portugal as well as the Italian island of Sicily). [1]

The very first revelation of the Holy Quran was Read in the name of thy Lord (Quran 96:1), clearly indicating the importance of knowledge. Prophet Mohammad (saw) declared it the duty of every Muslim to seek knowledge. The newly established Muslim empire thus began to stress upon education and knowledge, in line with the teachings of Islam, beginning early in the eighth century AD.

The Umayyad Caliphate in Damascus, Syria around 712 A.D began the Muslim quest for science by procuring the scattered existing knowledge of all ancient cultures. Greek cities under Roman rule which the Muslims conquered, such as the cities of Alexandria in Egypt, Damascus in Syria and Antioch in present day Turkey, held state archives and private collections of Greek scientific and philosophical text. Treatises were also obtained from newly conquered cities in Persia. The Muslims procured scientific text from the ancient civilizations of India, China and Iraq (Babylon) as well. This massive collection of all available knowledge from various cultures was then translated into Arabic.

After the Umayyad dynasty, the Abbasid Caliph Al-Mansur greatly enhanced this tradition at his Baghdad based caliphate around 762 A.D. Abbasid Caliph Harun ul-Rashid who featured very often in the Arabian Nights, was crowned Caliph in 786 A.D. He set up a scientific academy (which also included an astronomical observatory later) known as Bayt al-Hikmah (House of Wisdom) in Baghdad, Iraq. It was here that Muslim Scholars rigorously translated the ancient works and created ground-breaking new sciences. The ancient works came from Babylonian (ancient Iraq), Egyptian, Greek, Chinese and Indian Scholars such as Aristotle, Plato, Archimedes, Hippocrates, Pythagoras and others. [2]

The Muslim world created new sciences such as Chemistry and Algebra, as well as greatly developed existing sciences.

Around 756 A.D, the Umayyad Prince Abd-al-Rehman established Muslim rule in Al-Andulus (Spain). Over the next three hundred years, Muslim Spain (Al-Andulus) became the greatest center of science in Europe, at a time when the rest of Europe was in its dark ages (a period of 1,000 years from 400 to 1400 A.D). [3] This was a time when Al-Andulus boasted of clean beautiful streets, planned towns and free education for all. People in other European countries such as England, Germany and France lived in miserable conditions. Muslim rule in Spain (Al-Andulus) lasted over 700 years and ended in 1492.

The Fatimid dynasty in 909 A.D, started to rule Egypt. They established formal universities and schools, such as the world famous Al-Azhar University of Cairo set in 975 A.D. This dynasty also greatly encouraged learning.

The golden age of Muslim science and discovery took place in various parts of the Islamic World; Al-Andulus (Spain); Damascus (Syria); Baghdad (Iraq); Cairo (Egypt) Samarqand (Uzbekistan in Central Asia); Shiraz (Iran) and Istanbul (Turkey). This golden age lasted for more than 700 years. [4]

Europes version of modern scientific history begins with the Greeks (Archaic, Classical and Hellenistic periods) which existed between 800 BC to 27 BC. After this period, the Greco-Roman period began, with the establishment of Roman rule in Greece circa 27 BC, ending the Greek age. The Greeks golden age produced thinkers, physicians and philosophers such as Hippocrates, Galen, Aristotle, Euclid, Ptolemy and Archimedes. The Roman Empire officially ended in 476 AD, and thereafter Europe fell into scientific backwardness for the next 1,000 years (called the dark ages) till the European reawakening or the Renaissance in the mid 1400s. However, the European dark ages are the Muslim golden age, when Muslims took over science and discovery, beginning circa 750 AD and ending around 1500 AD.